


Dolor

by dustandroses



Category: Oz (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Ficlet, Gen, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Semi-graphic depiction of injuries, Vignette, gen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-12
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-08 13:41:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1943274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustandroses/pseuds/dustandroses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Miguel was covered with scars – inside and out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dolor

**Author's Note:**

> **Prompt Notes:** Inspiration for this story taken from the Live Journal community Tamingthemuse prompt #413: Prince Charming, and the [Oz Prompt-A-Thon 2014](http://oz-wishing-well.livejournal.com/) Prompt #21 - Scars, marks, tattoos.  
>  **Title Notes:** The Spanish word dolor can mean many things - "pain, grief, sorrow, ache, soreness, suffering." I think all of these are appropriate to this story, so I decided to use _Dolor_ rather than to just pick one.  
>  **Author Notes:** Specific Spoilers for Season One, but the story takes place Post-Canon.

Miguel was covered with scars – inside and out. Looking away from the mirror, he concentrated on the one in his palm, remembering the bright flash of agony as he thrust the shank though his own hand. He’d been surprised, at the time, to feel anything at all. The sharp, searing sting of the blade drawing a line of fire across his cheek had stolen all the pain he’d thought he had to give. He hadn’t realized there was anything left inside him worth offering to a greedy God. His sacrifice hadn’t been enough, though. His son had died as he watched – tearing Miguel into pieces – tearing him loose from his anchor, and sending him floating aimlessly in the void that was Oswald Penitentiary. 

Cheek and hand - they weren’t the first scars he’d earned in his life, but they’d been the most important. The knife in the gut that he’d received on his first day in Oz had almost killed him, but it hadn’t been _aimed_ at him, he’d just been the closest body that idiot could find – the nearest target of opportunity. He’d been the sacrifice on the altar of one weak child’s pride. All that kid had wanted was the status that came from killing a man while in prison. He hadn’t even done that right, because Miguel was a survivor. In the end, it hadn’t meant anything at all. He sometimes wondered if maybe the reason he had so many tattoos was to distract from all the scars.

When he’d been twelve, he’d broken his leg, a compound fracture, the bone protruding from his skin, blood everywhere. He lay in the basement of the old abandoned Baldwin Hotel, eyes glazed with pain as his esé rushed to the payphone on the corner to call an ambulance. He couldn’t take his eyes off the jagged bone sticking out of his leg, blood running in rivulets down his shin to pool on the gritty basement floor. On the first floor his brothers drove the last of the 23rd Street gang out, shouting insults and warnings about who this part of town belonged to. Then they scattered, knowing the cops would accompany any ambulance that braved the dangers of their part of town.

His best friend Reynaldo stayed, face grey in the half-light that filtered down through the hole in the floor, shouting his reassurances into the basement, promising Miguel that he’d be all right, that the ambulance would be there soon. It had taken them 45 minutes to lift him through the hole his body had made when it fell through the rotted wood. He’d been in shock, shivering and clammy, on the edge of delirium. He’d refused to get into the ambulance unless Reynaldo came with him, and the two had grinned secretly to each other as the sirens wailed overhead, and the EMTs searched for a vein in Miguel’s arm. He’d remembered that Reynaldo had always wanted to ride in an ambulance, even through the pain that tied him closer to his best friend.

These days that scar was a narrow silver line on his shin, just another reminder of what his life was all about – pain and sorrow – his heart so torn up and full of scar tissue that he could swear sometimes it was too fucked up to beat. Once upon a time, he’d been the best looking man in the barrio. His girl Maritza had loved the fact that she was the envy of all the other women. She’d called him her Prince Charming. Now, he was ugly, so full of scars that no one could possibly want him. Miguel turned away from the mirror, and lay down on his bed, curled up in his thin, scratchy blanket. He wondered how much he could bleed before there was nothing left inside him. If he bled out all the pain, would there be anything left at all?


End file.
